October 7 - 1822. Infinite love in the Divine Eucharist

In 1822, at the age of 23, Pauline wrote a mediation entitled “L’Amour infini dans la divine Eucharistie” (Infinite Love in the divine Eucharist). What could a young girl of that age write about the Eucharist if not “some sentimental considerations drowned in an overflow of affectivity” (J. Servel, Un autre visage. Textes inédits de Pauline Jaricot, Ed. du Chalet, 1962, p. 185)? Did Pauline write this text during one night in one go, while she was experiencing, in Saint-Vallier, a violent pain in the thumb of her right hand? Did she do it on the order of Abbé Würtz, who, made the reflection a bit lighter by correcting a few sentences that were a bit heavy without significantly modifying the writer’s thoughts? Mademoiselle Jaricot easily took up the pen, as can be seen in L’Amour infini dans la divine Eucharistie (Paris, Mame, 2005) and, later, in Le Rosaire vivant (Paris, Lethielleux, 2011). This first draft was undoubtedly reworked in Lyon, under the immediate supervision of Abbé Würtz, for a second edition, published in 1824. One does not find in this text the details of a seasoned theologian, nor all that concerns miracles.

Pauline wanted logically weld together the elements of the revealed truth, as she had assimilated them. She was nourished by the faith of the Church, charged with offering and perpetuating the sacrifice of salvation until the consummation of the ages, and by this means making the source of the Savior’s merits and graces inexhaustible, and finally keeping the reservoir of his precious blood always full. (J. Servel, Un autre visage. op. cit., p. 186) Pauline speaks to Jesus directly from the very first lines of the text: O adorable Heart of Jesus, you are the principle of the divine Eucharist... that is to say of the masterpiece of infinite love. What shall I say, Lord Jesus? By this sacrament you have found the way to unite man so intimately to yourself, that, becoming one with us, your heart becomes the principle of our spiritual life, as our own heart is the principle of our temporal life. (J. Servel, Un autre visage, op. cit., p. 186)

Pauline became aware of the love of Jesus and expressed this when she would write about a love that reveals itself to the eyes of Faith. To what excess of love have you loved us! Not content with having instituted the divine Eucharist, so that the Body and Blood of the infinite Victim might become the spiritual nourishment of our souls and the pledge of our glorious resurrection, you also wanted it to perpetuate the memory and merits of your life and death. (J. Servel, Un autre visage, op. cit., p. 186). How can we let ourselves be convinced by the infinite love of Jesus Christ? How can we understand the mystery of a crucified God, his humiliations, his crown of thorns, his annihilation in the divine Eucharist? How can we allow ourselves to be touched even in our senses? The God who is so generous manifests himself in his infinite love. Are not all the fruits of grace that Christ acquired for us during his Passion contained in the Eucharistic sacrifice, as St. Thomas Aquinas tried to explain (see J. Servel, Un autre visage, op. cit., p. 187)?

Does not everything refer to the love of God and do not all graces flow from the sacrament of love, the Eucharist? Of course, it is not easy to speak of the Eucharist celebrated every day, of the salvation acquired once and for all and of the sacrifice of Christ immolated every day, insisting on the merits, sufferings and death of Christ, as Pauline tried to do with the expressions of her time. However, she understood that the Eucharist is truly the source of all the other sacraments, since it is from it, as from a divine fountain that everything flows: baptism and the other sacraments rooted in the one love of the Trinity.

Today, more than ever, the Eucharist is the eminent thanksgiving and praise of the Father, the sacrificial memorial of Christ, the presence of Christ through the power of his word and his Spirit. It is at the heart of Christian life, at the heart of the Church’s mission, at the heart of evangelization. Participating in the Eucharistic sacrifice, the source and summit of all Christian life, the faithful, incorporated into the Church by baptism, offer the divine victim to God and offer themselves with it. Thus, both by reason of the offering and through Holy Communion all take part in this liturgical service, not indeed, all in the same way but each in that way which is proper to himself. Strengthened in Holy Communion by the Body of Christ, they then manifest in a concrete way that unity of the people of God which is suitably signified and wondrously brought about by this most august sacrament. (Dogmatic Constitution on the Church Lumen gentium, no. 11)